


Gruesome

by glassgoblin



Series: Carol's Word-A-Day Calendar [181]
Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-29
Updated: 2015-11-29
Packaged: 2018-05-04 01:09:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5314328
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glassgoblin/pseuds/glassgoblin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A run for supplies set during their time at the prison.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gruesome

The street was quiet, save for a few birds that were singing from the oaks that lined the sidewalks. It would have been a nice summer day, one ideal for spending time out in the sun and running a few easy errands. Michonne had the feeling that days like that were long gone though, and as nice as it might seem there was almost always something hiding in the shadows to beware of now. She adjusted her grip on her sword and nodded toward Glenn, signaling that the alley closest to her position was clear.

They moved further up the street, making sure it was safe and remained quiet as they approached the small town grocer that lay ahead at the end of the street. The small parking lot was ringed with cars so it was difficult to see what was there at the front of the store, but she expected that there would be a few walkers. They would have been trapped between the vehicles and have fallen into an apathetic stupor waiting for some kind of stimulus. The kind that the run team’s movement would create, so they were being extra cautious so that there wouldn’t be stray roamers behind them to box them in if anything went wrong.

Glenn held up a hand and she froze until he shook his head and pointed. They were getting close to the end of the street, and she was starting to be able to see between the parked cars. The front of the grocer looked intact, but there was a pile of bodies in front of the door that seemed ominous.   She stared, trying to make sense of what she was seeing until Daryl gave a sharp whistle and gestured them all forward again.

There were a few mobile walkers trapped in the parking lot, but between Daryl’s arrows and Michonne’s long reach with her sword they were dispatched between the group climbed across the trunk of a mid-sized car to get into the lot. There were walkers on the ground too, ripped apart from their attacks and left to turn. Glenn started putting them down as Michonne made her way to the pile-up at the front doors.

It was a gruesome sight, but one that she had seen before in various configurations. People panicked and tried to get away, only to trample each other and become trapped. Become victims as they clawed their way out from the jumble of other bodies that surrounded them. Michonne stopped a few feet away, frowning at the monstrosity that had been created out of desperation. The dead bodies had decayed, from time and weather, and they looked almost like a blob with writhing arms reaching out toward anything they could claw at or bite. It was pathetic and mesmerizing and she hadn’t realized that she had stared for so long until an arrow went through the skull of one of the walkers closest to her, and Daryl shouldered her aside to retrieve it.

“Gotta clear this and keep going. Might be something left inside.” He gave her a side-eyed look and she nodded. “You okay?”

“Yeah, fine.” She frowned again, not wanting to think of the walkers as they had been before, desperate, terrified people. “I’m ready.”


End file.
